


Able-Bodied Men

by Ataraxetta, checkthemargins



Series: these hands made of splinters [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Torture, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Steve Rogers/Other - Freeform, my unabashed scar kink, very brief M/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-06
Updated: 2014-05-06
Packaged: 2018-01-23 18:12:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1574858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ataraxetta/pseuds/Ataraxetta, https://archiveofourown.org/users/checkthemargins/pseuds/checkthemargins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve marches out of Austria a hero. Bucky marches out of Austria broken in ways Steve's afraid he can't fix.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Able-Bodied Men

**Author's Note:**

> Hiya! This is my first foray into the world of Marvel and part one of a series that I plan to keep dabbling in that will stretch to modern times and Avengers era as well. I'm going off of movie verse and Captain America: The First Vengeance (which, for anyone who knows me will know fulfilled my hurt!fave needs on every possible level and is also canon and that's just beautiful). I'm sure I've messed some things up, so feel free to point those out. 
> 
> A huge thank you to Ella, beta supreme, Nika for the hand holding, and a note to say that this whole thing would've been so much easier if I could've just written in Colonel Phillips's point of view.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel or Captain America or any of its characters/premises/settings. This is just for kicks. Series title is from a Murder By Death song.

**Able-Bodied Men**

The second time Steve tries to enlist, his physician is named Dr. Ryan, a wiry man with balding dark hair, a big nose and bright green eyes. He's a jerk from the start, eyeing Steve up and down with a sneer before he starts the physical, and muttering under his breath about this waste of time. Steve has spent his whole life growing accustomed to bullies, but this kind of disdain takes him by surprise, coming from a man at least twenty years his senior and hardly bigger than Steve. His breath whistles every time he inhales and his glasses are thick as bottle bottoms.

"I can't recommend you," Ryan says when he's finished, his voice a bored drawl. "You're ineligible. I don't know why you bothered to try."

"It's only right, isn't it?" Steve answers. He's tired and as close to short-tempered as he's ever been. "I'm a young man and our country is at war. It's my duty as a citizen of—"

"They don't just need young men," says Ryan. He stamps a 4F onto Steve's application. "They need young, _able-bodied_ men."

Steve shakes his head stubbornly. "I just need a shot. I can handle it. What harm would it do to give me a chance?"

"It's a waste of money and a waste of time," Dr. Ryan says. He doesn't sound bored anymore; he looks angry, like Steve's offended him. "A waste at best and a liability at worst."

"I can fight," Steve insists. "I owe it to those men—"

"You owe it to those men to not make them carry around the dead weight of a sickly asthmatic who can't keep up."

"I ca—"

"You'll get yourself killed, or you'll get other men killed. Probably both." Ryan stands up, straightening his coat and picking up his clipboard. "Get yourself a new dream, son. You'll never be a soldier."

Steve holds the doctor's gaze until Ryan heaves a sigh and leaves, and then hangs his head, his eyes prickling uncomfortably and his ears burning. He pulls his pants back on and shrugs into his shirt. A nurse steps in while he's doing up the buttons and gives him a small smile. It looks pitying and Steve hates it, but he smiles back politely. She's pretty, dark black hair and dimples. "Ma'am."

"Don't take what the doc said personal," she says, taking a seat next to him with a clipboard on her lap so he can sign out. "He was turned down too, y'know? Last time around. His file looks a lot like yours."

Steve frowns thoughtfully, eying the curtain where the doctor disappeared. "Kinda hard not to take it personal then, ain't it?" he asks, looking at the nurse again. "If he looks at me and sees a bit of him, and doesn't think much of himself."

"You're lookin' at it all wrong," she says. She pushes her hair back over his shoulder and he catches sight of the little tag on her lapel. Her name is L. Winston. "He was trying to let you down easy."

Steve can't help a small laugh. "You call that easy?"

Ms. Winston smiles. "You know what I mean. He was trying to give you the facts, save you disappointment. You know he tried to enlist seven times under different names?"

Steve's palms start to sweat and he's glad she's busy scrawling something on her clipboard, because he's a terrible liar. "He, uh, really wanted to join, didn't he?"

She nods and takes his enlistment form so she can finish filling it in. "He was trying to do you a kindness, is what I'm saying. Don't be too hard on him."

"I’m not," Steve tells her honestly.

"There's so many important jobs," Nurse Winston says. "The doc saves lives every day. He's saved hundreds of people, but all he can see is that he didn't fight for his country at war."

Steve huffs a little laugh, heart pounding in his chest, feeling desperation and disappointment coil together like a rock in his stomach. "D'you think I'll grow into that? Bitter and blind?"

Nurse Winston hands him the clip board with a smile, and Steve signs at the x and hands it back, his mouth dry. He feels like a failure. Nurse Winston stands up and regards him with a curious sort of smile on her face. "I think you've got a lot of heart, and that's more than most of them soldiers overseas can say."

Steve blushes, just a bit, and can't stop his smile. He'd like to ask her out, but while he'd willingly march to the front lines and die for his country, this particular sort of courage has always eluded him. "Thank you, ma'am."

It's a long train ride home, and well after midnight by the time he lets himself into his apartment. There's some kind of party going on downstairs that's shaking the floor. Someone very drunk is singing very loudly. Steve toes off his shoes by the front mat and drops his keys in the bowl on the table by the door. The lights are off in Bucky's room but his door is open, which means he's either out or doesn't have company tonight. Steve walks in to find him asleep, loosely curled on his side. Bucky doesn't snore but he's a mouth-breather when he sleeps, so every breath is loud. Steve strips down to his underwear, kicking his clothes into the pile of Bucky's in the middle of the room.

"Mm?" Bucky says sleepily when Steve pulls the blankets back so he can slip under them. "Steve?"

"Yeah. Mind if I stay here tonight?"

"S'fine," Bucky slurs. Steve settles on his side and watches Bucky yawn and rub at his eyes. His hair is tousled. "Where've you been?"

"Nowhere," says Steve.

Bucky snorts and tugs the covers over them both. "You're the worst liar. You tried again, didn't you?"

"Shut up," says Steve, but it sounds distracted even to him. He's still rattled from his conversation with Dr. Ryan, and the one with Nurse Winston. "Thought you had a date tonight."

"Did. Was fun."

"That's all?"

Bucky shrugs. "Wasn't feelin' it tonight."

Steve grins. "Having performance issues pal? I hear—"

"Shut the fuck up, Rogers," Bucky says without any heat. Steve watches his lips pull into a smile.

"D'you get your orders?" he asks, heart in his throat the same way it is every day when he asks. Bucky's been in the army since he was drafted, but it's different now they're at war. Bucky could be shipped out any time. It's a miracle he hasn't been already.

"Nah," says Bucky, and Steve exhales, relieved. He listens to the loud twitch of the second hand on the clock in the living room. It doesn't soothe him the way it used to before his mom died.

"I don't want you to go," he says. His voice comes out thin, insubstantial. He digs his fingernails into his palms. Bucky's hand finds his shoulder and squeezes. This hasn't really been a habit—sleeping in each other's beds, not since they were kids—but ever since Pearl Harbor they've been keeping each other close. When they were teenagers, Steve's mom used to warn him that he and Bucky were getting co-dependent. It had never really sounded like a bad thing.

"You'll be all right," Bucky says and it makes Steve smile, the way they're always worrying about each other. "I'll come home and you'll be married to a knockout and have seven kids."

Steve quirks an eyebrow. "Seven?"

"Seven."

Steve rolls his eyes and shifts onto his stomach, bringing his arms up to wrap around his pillow. Bucky scoots a bit closer. It's been cold the last few weeks. Steve can feel goose bumps on his skin but he forces himself to withstand the chill. He's a waste at best. A liability at worst. He's dead weight. He'll get the real men killed while he plays soldier. "The nurse at the enlistment office, she said I have a lot of heart."

"Yeah? You ask her out?"

"No."

"Idiot."

Steve grins into his arm but smiling hurts. He feels inexplicably like he might cry and he closes his eyes tight. He can't bear the thought of staying here, the guilt eating away at him while other men, better men, lay down their lives. When they first met, Steve had been so envious of Bucky, who was strong and handsome and charming and grew up that way too. For a long time Steve thought Bucky was everything that he wanted to be, but times have changed. Steve loves Bucky more than anything in the world, but he doesn't want to be him anymore. What's killing him is his body's inability to let him be himself. He wasn't meant to give less than everyone else.

"She's right," Bucky says after a few minutes. He sounds nearly asleep again.

"What?" Steve rasps.

Bucky's hand finds his back, pats right there in the center. "You've got a lot of heart."

Steve snorts. "If only that was enough."

Bucky makes an unhappy sound in his throat and pinches Steve's arm hard. Steve yelps and rolls away, smacks him with a pillow while Bucky laughs and lets it happen. Bucky's kind of an asshole, and the best man Steve has ever known. He lies on his back and looks up at Steve, moonlight making his skin look blue.

"It's enough," he says. "It's always been enough."

Steve doesn't know what to say, and he feels his face pull into an awkward smile. Bucky squeezes his arm, thumbing over the sore spot where he pinched to soothe the ache, and then turns onto his side, curling up again and closing his eyes. Steve resituates his pillow and lies down too, on his back this time, staring at the ceiling while Bucky dozes and, eventually, falls asleep, breath loud and hot on Steve's arm.

Steve's skin is crawling, his fingers itching, every instinct desperate to do something, to make something of himself. He's always been weak but he's never really felt it, not before today, with the clinic and Dr. Ryan. People have probably thought it before but nobody's ever told him outright that he's not enough. The doc tried to enlist seven times before he gave up. Steve will try a hundred. A thousand. As many times as he has to. Bucky snuffles in his sleep and Steve turns to look at him. There's a lot of noble reasons Steve wants to join the army, and he can't feel guilty about this one selfish one. He can't let Bucky go alone.

The fifth time Steve tries to enlist, it's less than a month before his birthday. Bucky gets his orders to ship out to England with the 107th while Steve walks out of the enlistment center at the World Exposition of Tomorrow with orders to report to Camp Lehigh at 0800.

He shakes like a leaf the whole walk out of the park, so excited that he throws up twice when he gets home. He wakes up around eleven when Bucky climbs into his bed. Bucky's skin and hair are damp. It's been raining for a couple hours. He crowds up against Steve's back, slinging an arm around his hip. It's not exactly appropriate, but they've never been good at that anyway. 

"Thought you were dancin'," Steve slurs, not bothering to open his eyes.

"Last night at home," Bucky says. 

He's a little drunk. He has to be up in five hours to leave. Steve pats his hand, waking up a bit more, nerves making his teeth itch. He should say something about what happened tonight. He should tell Bucky that he's in. Instead he breathes deep and even. The words are all tangled up in his throat. Bucky's hair is freezing on the back of Steve's neck, his breath warm on the back of Steve's shoulder. Tomorrow, their lives are gonna change.

 

*

 

Steve spends his first week after the successful completion of Project Rebirth in a government-issue apartment in Manhattan, courtesy of the senator. It's nicer than any place Steve's ever seen, let alone set foot in. He doesn't have much to do, so he passes the time in the gym in the basement and reading through the books on the shelves in the living room. Honestly, he spends a lot of time in front of the bathroom mirror; he's never been a big reader.

His new body is more than he ever dreamed of. Even as a kid, reading comic books and hoping he'd grow up big and strong like the heroes in them, his hopes hadn't been this high. He didn't really think about the ways the serum might change him physically. He didn't really care beyond it making him fit enough for the front lines. The first thing he noticed, right after, was that it didn't hurt to breathe anymore. The second was that the doorway into the lab was two inches too short. The third was that it only took an hour for the bruise to form, darken and heal again.

He's still getting used to it. He has to adjust the way he moves. It takes him longer to sit down and none of his clothes fit anymore. None of Bucky's do either. Every scar he ever earned standing up for himself in shady alleyways is gone, the ones from scarlet fever too. His sense perception is intense; he can hear and see and smell and feel things so clearly that it leaves him shaking, sometimes, overwhelmed and his skin too sensitive to the touch. He keeps bumping his head and tripping over his feet. It's weird, and good.

He looks good. So sometimes he strips down and stands in front of the bathroom mirror and remember Agent Carter's reaction when he stepped out of the tank. He's bigger and faster and smarter and stronger. Maybe he's good enough for her now.

The second week since the successful completion of Project Rebirth, the Senator's plan kicks into action, and he wishes he hadn't taken for granted feeling big and strong and handsome and capable and good enough, because it only lasted eight days. On the ninth he becomes Captain America, a national icon, and he's never felt smaller.

 

*

 

It's late July and uncomfortably warm in Cleveland. Steve has his sketch book open in front of him. It's been a long day. The page is blank save for a rough sketch of a body, broad shoulders and a narrow waist, legs covered by blankets, a flyer above the bed that Bucky used to have above his own.

"Self-portrait?" someone says.

Steve turns his head to see a gorgeous girl with dark curls and ruby red lipstick, a pretty smile and an elegant black dress. He blinks, befuddled the way he always is in a woman's company.

"Does it look like me?" he asks.

The girl tilts her head. "I'm not sure. I haven't seen you without your clothes yet."

Steve laughs, pleasantly surprised. Since he started gaining a little fame, people are rarely so blunt with him anymore. He stands up to pull out the chair next to him so she can sit down. Her name is Leann Prince and she's a teacher. She's funny and gorgeous and she tells him she likes the way he looks in his civvies almost as much as she likes him in uniform. Steve takes her home a few hours later, and when she invites him in he accepts.

He lost his virginity when he was nineteen, and over the years and under Bucky's encouragement met a few girls since, but it's his first time since the serum, first time since he became Captain America and he's nervous. Excited. She feels tiny and fragile against him. They fuck in her bed and it feels incredible. She's tight and hot around him and she's loud about her pleasure. Steve's careful with her, careful not to get carried away, but it's good and heady and hot, and once they've both come he holds himself above her, inside her, panting, and kisses her full lips again, and again.

Leann shivers and gasps, pulls away after a few minutes with a surprised look on her face. "Are you...?"

He's hard again inside her. He doesn't have much of a recovery period anymore. "Yeah," he says apologetically. She tips her head back and laughs, delighted, and digs her fingernails into his arms.

"Well Captain America," she teases, "I never."

He quiets her with another kiss.

In his pants on the floor, there's a letter from Bucky. It says: _I'm so glad you're not here. I'm so glad you're safe._

 

*

 

In Italy, he meets Agent Carter again. She's a knockout, and he can appreciate that even though his ears are still burning from looking like an idiot in front of a bunch of his heroes. She doesn't pull her punches. The only person he's ever really confided in is Bucky, who coddled him. Steve's not used to complaining and being told to suck it up and fix it.

"Your audience contained what was left of the 107th. Everyone else was either captured or killed."

It's a strange thing, the way his whole body starts to hurt. Somewhere under the abject horror he's impressed by Agent Carter's composure, because she's standing perfectly calm while Steve is sure his guts have spilt all over the ground.

"The 107th?" His voice sounds far away. Sometimes when he's alone he imagines he can feel Bucky next to him, his breath warm on the back of Steve's shoulder. His heart feels like it's dropped into his boots.

"What is it?" she asks.

"Come on."

Steve's been dreaming about war his whole life. His dad died a soldier in the trenches and he figures every little kid who never met his father probably obsesses over why. His mom used to tell him he had soldier in his genes. In Brooklyn, where it was safe, and there were flyers and short films and Steve's own USO show, it all seemed really romantic. Intellectually Steve knows it's not, but he doesn't get a real glimpse of it until he breaks into a Hydra facility in Austria.

It's terrifying. Steve's never really been scared of much, but he's a glorified chorus girl walking into a warzone alone and he feels every inch of his inexperience on a profound level. It's overwhelming, but it doesn't slow him down—like his mom said, he's got soldier in his genes. The first few men he takes down he ducks down quick to check their pulse, to make sure they're still alive, Erskine's voice in his head asking him if he wants to kill Nazis. The first man he kills makes his stomach roll. Steve wonders if he had a wife, children, if his parents are still alive, how Hydra sends out death notices to the family. If anyone will even find him at all.

He finds the imprisoned 107th and a more besides and once they're free it feels, strangely, like he belongs here. These men have seen Hell, some of them more than others, and their grins are sharp, their banter calming.

"I'm looking for a Sergeant James Barnes," he says, but most of the men are distracted. One who hears him gives a nod.

"Not sure if I know him, but there's an isolation ward in the factory."

Hope blooms bright and awful in Steve's chest. "Thanks."

The soldier gives him a wary look. "No one's ever come back, Captain. Might not like what you find."

It turns out that Bucky's alive. Steve can't let himself think beyond that until after they take the base, once Hydra has fled and some couple hundred of them are regrouping under Steve's directive. Steve's been bossy since the day he was born and these men are exhausted, abused and in no state for decision making. Giving orders is easy.

"You thinkin' we'll camp here, Cap?" says Dum-Dum Dugan, who's funny and extremely capable and inexplicably wearing a bowler hat. He's been talking to Steve like they're old friends without either of them knowing each other's first name and Steve really appreciates it. Dugan's accent is New York, makes Steve think fondly of home. The two of them are piling a few of the Valkyrie missiles onto a pallet near the facility gates that one of the tanks is going to pull, and there's grease all over Steve's hands.

"Do you think we need to?" he asks. They've been here for a few hours, taking a headcount, taking inventory, routing the way home. The sun's just beginning to rise and most of the men seem raring to go, but there are injuries. They've got a little over a hundred miles to walk, and they need to take as much of the Hydra equipment as they can for Stark to take a look at.

"Fuck no," says Dugan. "Faster we get away from here the better. Most everyone's mobile. Your boy Jimmy's the worst of it."

"Bucky," Steve corrects. He runs a hand through his hair and resituates his helmet. There are a few men missing limbs, one with an infected wound, and all of them must be suffering after nearly two months in Hydra's care. That Bucky's the worst of it makes Steve's vision white around the edges. In the center of their company, between two of Hydra’s tanks, they've set up a small camp for the wounded. Bucky's pulled away from the rest of them, wrapped up in Steve's coat asleep.

"Bucky." Dugan says, following Steve's line of sight. "You know each other?"

"Since we were kids," Steve answers.

"You're still kids," says Dugan.

Steve offers a wry grin. "Feels like it sometimes."

When they've finished loading the last of the weapons, Dugan breathes in deep so the air whistles through his teeth, and leans agains the full pallet, arms crossed over his chest casually, eyes on their wounded men again. Steve gives him a curious look and Dugan shrugs. "I like Jimmy a lot, best friend I've made here. Thought he was dead, you know? Feel like I'm still grieving."

Steve puts a hand on his shoulder, just for a second. Dugan shakes his head. "He had a rough go of it, that kid, even before Schmidt's mad scientist got ahold of him."

"What happened?" Steve asks. "Why him?"

"He knocked out a guard who was beatin' on one of the boys."

Steve's breath catches in his throat. It's hard to find his voice. "He doesn't like bullies."

"Noble as hell, shit, but got him a lot of unwanted attention. Took a beating so bad he caught pneumonia, took another one that nearly killed him while he was sick. When he lived through it the scientist got interested."

"How long was he in the isolation ward?"

Dugan shakes his head. "Wasn't easy to tell how much time passed. A few weeks, maybe."

Steve lets Bucky sleep for as long as he can, doesn't wake him until they have to start the tanks up. Bucky comes up swinging but it's uncoordinated and his arm is caught up in Steve's coat. It's unexpected enough that Steve startles. "Whoa, hey, Buck, s'just me."

Bucky blinks, his lips parted and his heart racing under the hand Steve has on his chest. He hadn't lasted too long once the threat was gone the night before, still drugged to the gills and exhausted. He'd said Steve's name over and over until he passed out, but beyond that they haven't had much time to talk. He looks Steve up and down, reaction time still sluggish. He's a light weight at the best of times—even Steve can usually out drink him—and whatever they had him on has knocked him for a wallop. He wraps a hand around Steve's wrist, pressing his fingers in to feel Steve's pulse. Last night, Steve watched him take down three Hydra soldiers with an empty rifle, running on nothing but fumes.

"Steve," he says, his voice rough. Steve can't help the grin, and Bucky lets go of his wrist to reach up and touch the dimple in Steve's cheek. His gaze flickers down to Steve's chest again. "The hell're you wearing?"

"Don't be an ass," Steve drawls.

Bucky takes his hand back and rubs at his nose before picking himself up off the ground. Steve steadies him. Bucky's drowning in Steve's coat; he's lost more than a little weight under Zola's care. "We leavin'?"

"Yeah."

Bucky nods. "I want a gun."

 

*

 

It takes three days. It's Steve's first time living as a soldier, sleeping on the ground and taking shits in the woods. He's more comfortable with it than he has any right to be, and he doesn't let anyone know that this last week has been a series of firsts for him. Only Bucky gets it, and he won't say anything. 

He gets to know the other men on the way. It's strange to hear them whisper about him, like he's some kind of hero when they spent two months in Schmidt's dungeon. He's never been popular but these men seam _eager_ to become his friend. No one but Bucky and Peggy and Erskine have treated him like this before, not when he was small and sickly and not since he's been big and strong. These men respect him, and he shouldn't have had to earn it like this but it feels good that he did.

The first thing Bucky says in three days is, "Let's hear it for Captain America!" and Steve manfully resists the urge to pull him into a crushing hug, mostly because he's still not sure what Bucky's injuries are. The applause is embarrassing and amazing, undeserved but appreciated. He feels like he finally earned his rank.

He doesn't even have time clean up before he's beckoned to the command tent to speak with Colonel Phillips. Peggy gives him a smile when she tells him, and Steve watches her walk away before he turns to Bucky, gripping his arm. "Where are you gonna be?"

Bucky shrugs, yawning. "Gonna get some food. Come find me after?"

"Yeah," Steve agrees. Bucky's got him worried as hell and he doesn't want to lose him in the crowd. Steve squeezes his shoulder and Bucky offers a half grin before he goes.

Colonel Phillips looks haggered and half-amused, the way he always seems to in Steve's presence. He's chewing on some kind of twig and he says, "At ease," when Steve salutes. "Quite a show there, Rogers."

"Wasn't meant to be a show, Sir."

"You know the crazy part is that I believe it when you say that," says the Colonel. "Makes my job a goddamn nightmare. Are you fit for travel?"

Steve blinks. "Uh, yes, Sir."

"We're going to London. Leaving within the hour. We'll debrief you there."

"Just us?"

"You, me, Agent Carter, Stark."

Steve nods, jaw clenching unhappily. "Yes, sir. Do I have time to go say goodbye to—"

"Sergeant Barnes is coming with us. Need to debrief him too."

"Sir, he's injured. He just—"

"I know what he just. You think I don't know what he just? There's no secrets 'round here. I hear he spent a month with Schmidt's second-in-command."

Phillips's expression is neutral. He looks bored. Steve frowns.

"That's all the more reason for him to have time to—"

Phillips cuts him off. "He was tortured, which means they were looking for answers. I need to know what he told them when he broke."

Steve bristles. "He didn't tell them anything. He didn't break."

"Everybody breaks, Captain." Steve makes a face before he can control himself, fist clenching at his side. The colonel just gives him a winning smile, twig between his teeth. "Don't worry, son. I'll be gentle."

It all happens so fast, efficient in a way bureaucracy usually isn't. By the time Steve gathers his things, Bucky's been collected from dinner, and they're in separate cars for the drive to the airfield. Steve doesn't see him until they board the plane, and Bucky sinks into the seat next to him but when Steve opens his mouth Bucky shakes his head minutely, eyeing the others warily until he nods off, head dropping onto Steve's shoulder. Steve lets him sleep, bad feeling in his stomach nagging.

It's dark in London when they land and it's a long trip to the SSR base underground. Steve's debriefing is easy; he's got a photographic memory and the base has been destroyed. He does hand over the piece of blue glow he recovered, and Phillips seems happy about that. As happy as Phillips ever seems, anyway.

"We'll let Stark take a look at this. Knew you had that on you, by the way. You're terrible at hiding things."

"Never much liked hiding things," Steve says.

"Shit, kid, I didn't think they made 'em like you in the real world. We get you a map do you think you can recreate what you saw?" Colonel Phillips asks him.

"Yes, Sir."

"Good. We'll get started tomorrow. It's late and I haven't slept in a real bed in months."

Steve gets up to leave, and as he does the door opens and Bucky's led in. He's washed his face but he's still wearing the same clothes he was before and he smells like two months as a prisoner of war. His eyes find Steve, first, and don't look away for a long time.

"Sergeant Barnes, take a seat," says Phillips. "You look like Hell."

"Wanted to get this over with, Sir," Bucky says grimly, sitting down in the chair Steve just vacated. Phillips gives a commiserating nod.

"Uh huh, well let's…" He trails off when he notices Steve's still there, leaning against the wall in the corner of his office. The typographer looks too, and Colonel Phillips clears his throat. "Captain Rogers. You're dismissed."

Steve closes the door. He has no desire to embarrass the Colonel but he's not leaving Bucky in here alone. "With all due respect Colonel, I'd rather stay."

"Do you think I give a damn what you'd rather do? Get out."

"With all due respect, Colonel," Steve repeats. "I’d rather stay."

For a moment, Steve is sure that Phillips is going to try and have him escorted out of the room, but the Colonel lets the incredulous silence ring out for a long time, and then he says. "You're a massive pain in my ass, you know that?" 

He's obviously angry, but the way the tension leaks out of Bucky's shoulders is worth it. Steve nods. "Yes, Sir."

"Oh, well, good, so long as you know," Phillips mutters.

The debrief is anticlimactic. Phillips tells Bucky that he's heard Bucky's the best shot in the company, and Bucky says yes sir like it hurts him to admit it. He explains why he was taken into isolation, which Steve already knows, and Phillips asks a few questions about the other men, and what sort of work Hydra had them doing and how he got sick.

"You were injured," Phillips says. "You see a medic on base?"

"Briefly," Bucky says. "I'm all right. They were gonna keep me on light duty for a few weeks but then I got the order I'd be coming here."

"Did they take blood?"

"No, Sir."

"We'll need that," says Phillips. He's got Bucky's open file in front of him. "Says you have multiple puncture wounds in your arms. They keep you drugged?"

Bucky hasn't been read into Project Rebirth, and Steve hasn't had a chance to tell him exactly how he got to be a foot taller, a hundred pounds heavier and Captain America. Phillips is fishing and Steve has a pretty good idea why. It's been four months and seventeen days since Dr. Erskine was murdered and the last of his serum destroyed. Schmidt's scientist has no doubt been trying to recreate it.

"Not always," Bucky answers. He looks at Steve, who nods. They can trust the Colonel. "I don't speak much German and they knew that. I don't know much of what went on, even when I was lucid."

Steve stays quiet, mildly alarmed at how easy it is to let Bucky blatantly lie to a commanding officer. Bucky speaks German. Bucky is fluent in German, and a healthy handful of other languages Steve doesn't understand a word of. He's got a natural knack for them, and that must be in his file. The Colonel doesn't call him on it.

"Was he looking for answers?"

"At first, they asked some questions, but nothin' I knew the answer to or had ever heard of. They didn't seem all that interested in United States secrets. They kept talking about a serum, asking about Captain America."

"They know he was your best friend?"

Bucky snorts. "I didn't even know that. They thought I might've been part of it, 'cause I hadn't died yet. I don't even know what it was. Though I s'pose I can guess, now." He gives Steve a pointed look.

Phillips clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth a couple times, eyes Bucky seriously. "Zola kept you for nearly a month and you didn't have any of the answers Schmidt wanted. I think we all know you should be dead, son. What happened when he was done asking questions?"

Bucky's uncharacteristically still, his mouth drawn. "I don't know. I was a bit of a lab rat, I guess, but I don't know what he did."

The Colonel sits back in his chair. Steve's chest is aching. Bucky's hunched in on himself, too-skinny shoulders rounded and eyes narrowed, unblinking. Phillips closes his file. 

They're dismissed after that. Steve has a room in the compound, and Bucky is set up in a hotel in the building above them, but there was never really a question of where Bucky would be sleeping. They don't say a word until the door is closed, and even then they stand there for a long time, just looking at each other. 

Bucky leans back against the door, grey eyes dull. His voice is hoarse when he speaks. "What're you doin' here, Steve?" 

"I told ya, I joined the army."

It's an even weaker joke this time around. Bucky lifts a hand, coughs into his loose fist to clear his throat, lingering pneumonia wet in his chest. He doesn’t return Steve’s smile. "How?"

Steve doesn't know if he's asking how he got enlisted or how he became what he is, but the answers are one and the same. "A scientist for the SSR, Dr. Erskine, he recruited me right after I'd failed another physical trying to enlist. He said maybe what we needed to win this war was a little guy."

Bucky lifts an eyebrow, frowning deeply. "But you're not, anymore."

"I think he meant on the inside."

Bucky snorts, mouth quirking up at once corner just a little, but it's a perfunctory grin. "They, uh. In Austria, in the lab. I think I heard that name, Erskine. Something about a serum."

"It was called Project Rebirth. Me and about twenty other men were candidates. I got chosen in the end." Steve's skin tingling at just the memory, but he notices the way Bucky cradles one of his arms in the other, fingering at the inside of his elbow through his shirt. "It wasn't like that, Buck, like what...with Zola. I wanted it. I asked for it, and Dr. Erskine was a good man."

"Was?"

Steve takes a slow breath. "He was killed, almost as soon as I stepped outta the box. Right in front of me."

"Shit," Bucky breathes, and he tilts his head back against the door and closes his eyes, the smile on his face a little awed and not in a good way. Every time Steve tried and failed to enlist Bucky made a good show of sympathy, but he’d never been able to hide his relief. He's not even bothering to hide his disappointment now. 

"It wasn't like that," Steve says again. "I wanted to do it."

"Is that what he told you?" Bucky says. It's a low blow, but Steve takes it in stride. He's not as naive as Bucky thinks he is.

"Y'know, Buck, I figured it out all on my own.”

Bucky laughs like it's startled out of him, and the second he pushes himself off the door Steve closes the distance between them and tugs Bucky into his arms. It's their first proper embrace since back in Brooklyn and they fit different now. Bucky's smaller than him, nestles into the frame of Steve's body. He fists his hand in the back of Steve's hair and hugs him fiercely and Steve holds on as tight as he can without hurting him, tucks him in close, buries his face in the side of Bucky's neck. They told him Bucky was dead. Bucky was almost _dead_.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you," he says out of the blue.

"It doesn't matter," Bucky says hoarsely. "Stupid punk. I missed you."

"Missed you too, jerk." He breathes in deep, takes a second to collect himself before pulling back enough to see Bucky's face. "C'mon. You smell awful."

Bucky's answering smile is weak. "I smell like fucking roses."

"Don't fuck roses, Buck, they have thorns." Bucky pulls his hair and Steve snorts, stepping back a bit. He nods toward the ensuite. "Shower?"

Bucky's shaking like his legs are about to give out. He's been hiding how weak he is for days but it's caught up to him. He looks embarrassed. When they first met, Bucky was a mouthy loner from the orphanage down the street, ten going on forty and with a smile far more crooked than the one he's got now. He's never trusted easy. "Might need some help."

Steve shrugs under Bucky's arm to help him to take his weight. "Don't worry. I've needed your help bathing way more than you've needed mine."

"I just love these little competitions between us, Steve."

"Yeah, yeah, wise-guy," Steve says. "About time I get to take care of you for once."

"I didn't do much."

Steve snorts. "You've been protecting me since you were ten years old."

"You're mine to protect," Bucky says, just like that, fact. Steve pulls him a little tighter into his side.

The bathroom is small but the tub is a pretty good size. Steve turns the water on and finds some soap and a washcloth while Bucky gets undressed. "This is better than our apartment. Actual hot water. Remember that winter we had to share..."

His voice gets lost in his throat as soon as he turns around. Bucky's sitting on the toilet, slowly working his pants and underwear off, his shirt's already on the floor. When he looks up again and catches Steve staring, he looks away, pale cheeks reddening and jaw clenching. He forces a painful-looking grin. "See something you like, Rogers?"

"Bucky," Steve breathes.

"They weren't too concerned with keepin' me fed," Bucky shrugs, wincing as he shifts sore muscles and sinking his teeth into his bottom lip. His ribs are prominent and hipbones like razor blades, but there's still muscle definition there and it's nothing a few weeks worth of solid meals won't fix. It's not the weight loss or even all the bruises that have got Steve's world tilting on its axis. It's the scars. His legs, his arms, his back—a mangled mess, and two long ones on his abdomen that Steve touches before he can stop himself, surgical incisions. 

Bucky catches his wrist and when Steve looks up his eyes are scared. He looks so young, all of a sudden. "I don't. I don't know what they did. I don't know what they did to me. It doesn't matter."

They cut him open. Steve swallows back bile.

"They don't hurt anymore," Bucky mutters. "It doesn't matter. I didn't tell them anything."

"Bucky."

Bucky looks down at his hands. "It's over. It doesn't matter." 

Steve makes a wounded sound in his throat and he can see Bucky retreating the way he did during the walk back to camp, when he was silent and blank-faced. Lost in his own head, worn out beyond measure. Steve's terrified that maybe part of Bucky is gone, left back on that table in Zola's lab.

Steve squats down in front of him, cups the back of Bucky's head and tugs him down gently, slants their mouths together, chaste and soft. Steve's lips are fuller than they used to be and Bucky's are warm and chapped. He kisses Steve back carefully and one of his shaking hands cards through Steve's hair. It's not their first kiss. Not their second or third or tenth. Steve's mom cried a little the one time she caught them, but even when he tried to Steve's never felt guilty the way he probably should. Most of the time it feels like they were written in the stars, like if God wasn't okay with this he wouldn't have made Bucky Steve's soulmate. 

The kiss breaks with a quiet sound, lost under the noise of the running water. Steve touches his lips to Bucky's jaw, his cheekbone and his temple. Bucky takes in a tremulous breath that cuts off harshly in his throat, and Steve knows he's crying. Bucky's cheek is rough with stubble and wet against Steve's, and they stay just like that until Bucky exhales deeply and pulls away, wiping a hand over his eyes.

"I'm tired," he murmurs, like an apology. "I'm really. I'm just really tired."

As though that's all it is, like he had a rough night out drinking and just needs to sleep it off. "Yeah. You look it." 

Bucky makes a face and Steve squeezes his knee, standing again to give him a hand up.

They have to drain the water and refill it three times before Bucky's actually clean, and they go through nearly a whole bar of soap. Bucky's not much help, but he moves when Steve urges him to, lifts his arms and legs. Steve talks the whole time. He tells Bucky about Dr. Erskine, and about Peggy and the Colonel and the SSR. He tells him about the USO shows, how he makes an idiot of himself on a daily basis, and that at least gets Bucky laughing, but he goes quiet and brittle again when Steve washes his hair. By the time Steve's got him out of the bath and dry he's barely conscious. Steve shaves his face for him because Bucky's hands are shaking, and doesn't say a word when Bucky spends six minutes brushing his teeth and then brushes them one more time for good measure.

He's asleep the second his head touches the pillow. Steve tucks the blankets around him, picks up the towel he dropped and goes back into the bathroom. He strips out of his blazer and shirt and pants, brushes his teeth and shaves and then spends an embarrassing amount of time hunched over the sink, crying quietly into his hands. For his best friend, for the men he killed and the ones he couldn't save, for his dad and his mom and the scrawny kid he used to be. For a lot of things.

He washes his face and takes a few deep breaths, and then joins Bucky in bed. The sheets are soft, the mattress cheap. Bucky still sleeps with his mouth open, and he wakes up when Steve turns the lamp on the bedside table off. Steve's eyes don't take any time to adjust. Bucky opens his eyes, blinks sleepily. "Steve?"

"Right here," Steve says. 

Bucky rolls onto his side to face him. The bed isn't that big. They're pressed close. Bucky touches calloused fingertips underneath one of Steve's swollen eyes. "Were you cryin'?"

"No," Steve says, and Bucky gives him a lazy smirk.

"Yes you were, you big baby," Bucky says, like his own eyes aren’t red-rimmed from blubbering.

Steve laughs breathily. "Don't be an ass."

Bucky offers a non-committal hum, tilts his chin up and rests his forehead against Steve's. He presses his palm to Steve's chest, the way he used to when Steve was real sick, so he could feel his heartbeat. "Zola just wanted. He wanted to know how I survived, when none of the others did. He thought there was something special about me, but it was just you, y'know?"

"Me?"

"Mm," says Bucky. His hand used to cover the entire breadth of Steve's chest. It doesn't anymore, stays right there in the middle and Steve feels his lips tremble just a little. Maybe the serum made his heart bigger, too. Bucky's palm is cool on his skin. "Had to live. Couldn' die without seein' you again."

Steve thumbs the cleft of Bucky's chin. "Can't die now that you have."

Bucky huffs a congested laugh, mostly asleep again, body going slack. Steve grazes his fingers over the scars on Bucky's belly and swallows hard past the obstruction in his throat. 

He just got Bucky back. He's not gonna lose him again.

 _end_.


End file.
